In Zeiten, in denen auf jedem zweiten deutschen Privat-TV-Sender eine
Sendung über irgendwelche Tattoo-Studios läuft und die Bildzeitung die
Tätowierungen der Prominenten diskutiert, weiß der geneige Beobachter, die
wilde Zeit des Tattoos ist vorbei, der Hautschmuck ist in der Mitte der
Gesellschaft angekommen.
Und so hat heute jeder renomierte Verlag Hochglanz-Tattoo-Bücher im Angebot.
Kristian Misser, Tattoo-Freund, Scene-Kenner und Autor des Scandinavian
Tattoo Magazines legt mit dem Buch "Inside the Tattoo Circus" nun ein Buch
vor, dass noch die Wildheit vergangener Tage ausstrahlt. Das Buch bietet
einen wilden Ritt quer über den Erdball, durch Stile und Verwendungsformen
der Hautkunst.
Nicht immer vollständig, nicht immer mit den besten Bildern, aber
hochinteressant.
Text:
Lead
Interview with Kristian Misser (pre-made Interview)
How did you get the idea to write this book?
Misser: I developed the idea back in the late summer of 2006 while I was extending my tattoo book library. I love books about tattoos, but I’ve always been lacking in a really good all round tattoo book: A book that can easily be comprehended by people who don’t know the tattoo world from within, but still a book of high quality that also tattooists can take pleasure in reading.
The title ’Inside the Tattoo Circus’ may sound negative to some people. Why did you choose this title?
Misser: Actually, it wasn’t quite me that chose this name for the book. I’d rather say that the book ’created’ the title. When I started working on the idea, I soon realised that I would fail if I had to make out for each and every style that’s in the book. That’s why I started to get in touch with different tattooists, whom I knew were internationally highly respected for their work with the different styles, and asked them if they would like to contribute to my book by writing a piece.
I got a lot of positive answers, and it didn’t take long before I had many different tattooists from all over the world writing a piece for the book. Therefore, I couldn’t refrain from feeling a bit like the host of my own book, even though I was writing much more than any of the other tattooists. The feeling of hosting some of the best tattooists in the world made me think of the host in a circus, whose job is also to presents skilled artists.
This is how I came up with the title, and after thinking it over for a while I decided to build the book around the title, and present the book as a circus performance on paper with me as the host introducing the different chapters in which the tattooists perform in words and pictures.
A lot of tattooists and other people connected to the tattoo community have been involved in the book. Was it easy for you to get people to like the idea?
Misser: Since I’ve written articles about tattoos for various magazines, I started getting in touch with the people I knew well, and whom I’d previously been interviewing for magazines. The first tattooists I got in touch with were Henning Jorgensen, Guy Atchinson, Aaron Bell, Joe Capobianco and Bob Tyrell. All of them are tattooists that I’ve previously made big portraits of, and some of them I’ve met at different occasions. From then on, the rest just followed in rapid succession and the book began to take shape.
What has been the main challenge in writing the book?
To maintain control of the situation. When I initially got the idea to the book, I didn’t have a clue about this huge project I was about to venture into. One thing is to get some of your friends and tattoo contacts to write to the book, but I also had to explain my book project to lots of new people, and get them involved too. When you decide to write a book that covers all aspects of the modern tattoo, you need to involve tattoo magazines, tattoo websites, models and people who have a historical approach to the world of tattoos. So it was a great challenge for me to get in contact with the different people, keep track of all contributions that I received for the book, and finally try to maintain control of the situation so things wouldn’t get too messed up.
It took you about one year to finish the book. Have you had many ups and downs on your way?
Misser: Yes and no. In the beginning everything just kept moving forward: I got a lot of mail everyday and I had so many things to work with. I loved getting my mail packages, because it confirmed that I was actually in full swing, and that the work with the book was progressing. But naturally, as time went by the generosity of my mail man seemed to decrease.
However, my biggest concern has been to finish and complete the different chapters just the way I wanted them to be. There are tattooists who I really wanted to contribute to the book, but who hasn’t been able to find the time or wish to be in it which I ‘m truly sad about, but when I look at the line up of tattooists and other people that did contribute to the book, I have nothing to be dissatisfied about! If I look back at the whole process and was asked if I wanted to do it all over again, I’d definitely say yes!
Aren’t you afraid that someone sitting in a far corner of the tattoo community feels neglected because he or she is not (mentioned) in your all round tattoo book?
Misser: I certainly hope there isn’t! I really believe that I’ve gone all the way round the block. When I was working on the presentation of the book, there were some things that I didn’t think about, so many things have come by later in the process. For example, when I was writing the presentation for the chapter about pin-up tattoos, it struck me that I had to have something about cover girls in tattoo magazines. This way the book has seemed to grow in more than one case. Just like that, something new that needed to be in the book popped up.
Of course there’ll always be some one who is going to feel left out because he or she is not in the book. Here, I especially think of the subject of piercing, which is often associated with tattoos. But I decided to make a book only about tattoos and not piercing.
Why should people buy your book?
Misser: People shouldn’t buy my book, but ‘our’ book. I don’t see this book as strictly my book, but rather as a book belonging to the world of tattoos that’s written out of a passion and wish to invite other people into our common world of tattoos. People with a trained eye will also observe that I’ve assigned myself the title as the host on the cover, which is actually precisely what I am.
